


day twenty two: role reversal

by Hannah (hannahoftheinternet)



Series: HartmonFest 2019 [22]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Dark Cisco Ramon, Evil Cisco Ramon, Hartmon Fest 2019, M/M, POV Hartley Rathaway, POV Third Person, Personality Swap, Present Tense, Role Reversal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-22
Updated: 2019-05-22
Packaged: 2020-03-09 19:28:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18923551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hannahoftheinternet/pseuds/Hannah
Summary: "The first sign that anything is wrong is that Cisco is kissing him. Which would normally be fine, except that they’re at work. In front of people. They had both agreed that PDA was for the heterosexuals (i.e. Barry and Iris). And yet, here they are: kissing. At work. In front of people."





	day twenty two: role reversal

**Author's Note:**

> TW: choking, blood, murder mention, sex mention

The first sign that anything is wrong is that Cisco is kissing him. Which would normally be fine, except that they’re at work. In front of people. They had both agreed that PDA was for the heterosexuals (i.e. Barry and Iris). And yet, here they are: kissing. At work. In front of people.

Hartley gives Cisco a very gentle push and their lips disconnect. “Remember what we said about public displays of affection,  _ mi rey,  _ they’re for the heterosexuals.” He inclines his head in Barry’s direction.

Barry holds up his hands innocently. “Hey, what?”

Cisco smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes, making Hartley wonder if the short fight was really as harmless as it seemed. “Sorry. Just happy to be alive.”

“Cisco,” Caitlin says. “You’re bleeding.”

He  _ is _ bleeding. Thin red rivulets trickle from his forehead, and a stream of the same threads down from the corner of his mouth. Hartley mentally kicks himself for not having noticed before.

“Nothing a Band-Aid won’t fix,” Cisco responds easily, and Caitlin closes her mouth again. “I’m gonna go get cleaned up. Hart, wanna come help?” Without waiting for an answer, he goes out into the hall. Barry fires off a  _ what-the-hell _ look, but Hartley shrugs in answer and jogs down the hall after his boyfriend.

The bathroom door creaks as he opens it and asks, “What do you need my he--mm!” Cisco has seized him by the front of his shirt and pulled their lips together into a bruising, open-mouthed kiss. He’s never been able to resist Cisco’s kisses, so he leans in happily and they stand in the middle of the bathroom, wrapped up in each other.

Then Cisco rests a hand on Hartley’s neck and starts to squeeze.

All his warm-and-fuzzies dissipate at the sudden pressure, and Hartley reacts on instinct, jabbing Cisco in the solar plexus with an elbow and taking a fighting stance when the hand leaves his throat. He wipes his mouth, touches his throat, swallows hard and shakes his head to rid his vision of the little blurs that have appears. “What the hell?”

Cisco just watches him, smiling.

_ That is not Cisco’s smile _ .

Hartley staggers back, all his defenses going up at once. Martial arts training, self defense classes, even the mental barriers he started erecting when psychic metas came out of the woodwork, every method of protection he has. He keeps a penknife in his belt loops for this very reason, in case he’s caught unawares without his normal weapons, and he very subtly slides it out and open.

That’s when he hears what’s wrong, and chills run up his spine. He’s only ever heard this before, interrogating a psychopath who had acquired powers. Her heartbeat had stayed the same the entire time, never spiking or dropping once, just the same steady  _ ba-bump  _ as she easily discussed the brutal murders she committed.

In a stressful, violent, or even arousing situation, Cisco’s heartbeat should be elevated. But it’s as steady as Hartley has ever heard it.

His Cisco is not a psychopath, which leads him to the logical conclusion: this is not his Cisco.

Hartley’s manipulation skills are rusty, as he’s had very little reason to use them, but he knows they’re still there, so he pours on as much charm as he can muster and says, “Why don’t you wait here for me? There’s some stuff I need to get…” He lets his voice trail off in a brazen hint as to what kind of stuff he’s getting and, thank whomever is listening, Cisco falls for it hook, line, and sinker. He leans back against the wall, grins lecherously, and tells Hartley that he’ll be waiting.

This Cisco is not as brilliant as his normal counterpart.

Hartley fumbles with the bathroom door, opens it, and hoofs it to where the rest of the team is waiting. “I think Cisco got hit with something weird,” he says, and all conversation in the Cortex stops. Everyone turns to look at him quizzically, and he goes on. “It’s like--” he doesn’t know how to describe it-- “he’s from the mirror universe.” 

Caitlin and Barry both get identical looks of understanding on their faces, but not HR. “English?” he says.  _ Do they not have  _ Star Trek  _ on his Earth? _

“His personality is flipped. He’s evil. Like the mirror universe from  _ Star Trek. _ He’s…” Hartley runs out of euphemisms and decides to go straight to the point. “He choked me.”

“He choked you?” Caitlin is horrified.

“Not violently.” He hedges around the next few words, professionalism wanting him to stop speaking but the need to explain everything being more important. “Sexually. Some part of his evil brain remembers that we’re having sex, apparently.” That’s more words than he was going to say. Cisco is rubbing off on him, and not in a favorable way.

“Oh.”

Everyone is standing unsure, debating what to do, until Barry pipes up, “Where is he?”

“I left him in the bathroom down the hall.” And Barry’s gone in a lightning streak, out the door and down the hall and back again with his shirt smoking slightly. Caitlin flicks ash off his collar, but he apparently doesn’t notice.

“I stuck him in the Pipeline,” he says to Hartley. “One of the cells with the power dampeners.”

“Excellent,” Hartley says, making for the exit again. “I’m going to have a chat with him. If you hear ungodly shrieking, come to the rescue.” He doesn’t specify if it’ll be him or Cisco shrieking, because at this point, it could go either way.

Which is how he ends up sitting on the floor of the Pipeline, a thick sheet of transparent aluminum between him and his boyfriend, feeling as though he just stepped into a parallel world.

_ Note to self: parallel worlds aren’t weird to me anymore. Get new similes. _

Cisco says something rude in Spanish, something along the lines of “asshole traitor tease,” and Hartley grinds his teeth trying not to respond in kind. He’s already run about fifteen scenarios though his head and got the most likely one: the metahuman Cisco faced off with earlier has some sort of personality-altering power. This also explains why she randomly acquired an army of random civilians ready to do her evil bidding. He makes another mental note to hunt her down and throw her in jail as retribution for her adverse effect on his boyfriend and the general populace. It would give him great satisfaction to see her behind bars and wearing power dampeners. After she reversed her effect.

Assuming it can be reversed. The hope takes center stage in Hartley’s mind, but he knows there’s a chance this is permanent.

_ Not yet, Hartley. Problem for later. _

“Do you have an alliterative nickname for the meta you fought today?” he asks, keeping his face carefully neutral, ready for whatever response he gets.

“Bitch,” Cisco snarls. Hartley’s skin crawls. His Cisco doesn’t  _ snarl. _

Evenly, he says, “Creative,” and a wicked smile that looks like it hurts the corners of his mouth creeps up Cisco’s face.

“Yeah,” he says, biting his lip so hard that a small bead of blood appears. “Yeah, you know exactly how creative I can get.”

It’s then that Hartley realizes he’s been here before. In the Pipeline, across from Cisco, saying rude things because he doesn’t know what else to say, because anything is better than confronting what actually wants to come out of his mouth.

Only this time, he’s on the other side of the glass.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry this took me TWO MONTHS to write. I went through three drafts of this before I was happy.
> 
> Comments are a writer's best friend!


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